


Seafoam

by stelliums



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Destiny Islands (Kingdom Hearts), Gen, Kid Xion (Kingdom Hearts), Mermaid Naminé
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:36:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25334758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stelliums/pseuds/stelliums
Summary: Twice a treasure-seeking mermaid met Xion, and one time that she let her leave.
Relationships: Kairi & Riku & Sora & Xion, Naminé & Xion (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	Seafoam

There had been stories about her for as long as there had been stories. A girl made from the waves themselves, molded and shaped by the water. In some drawings she would have a tail, in others slender legs never completely revealed. Each story had a similar theme. In the cool, calm moments after a stormy night that left children cowering in their beds and ships wrecked upon the sharp rocks that were said to have protected the islands from foreign invaders, she would arise from the sea to scavenge for shiny trinkets among the shipwrecks.

During this season, there were always storms, so there were always shipwrecks. Naminé liked to watch the children of the island play on the beach. Older siblings dipping delightfully terrified younger siblings into the gently lapping waves, or pulling those who were too young out of the water when their curiosity had gotten the better of them. She had poked her head out from behind the rocks to see them, but was careful that they would only catch elusive glimpses of her. Enough to write stories about, or compose music about, or make the subject of a painting.

If someone discovered her and brought her home, the reverence would be replaced with a darker curiosity. She would never be returned to the ocean and left to her own devices, to appear to reform from seafoam as she always had. As the situation between her and the islanders stood, they acknowledged her secretive presence with displays of their own talent. The art was captivating to stare at but it was ultimately for the artist or a friend of theirs, not for her to keep and treasure.

Out of all of the children that she saw on the beach, one caught her attention. A girl around her own age, with black hair that she had messily cropped to frame her face and blue eyes that matched the colour of the ocean on a calm summer’s day. She would walk along the shore, barefooted toes making intents in the soft sand, and pick up what the sea had pulled ashore. Smooth, wave-tossed glass, sea shells, glass bottles with model ships or unreadable messages inside.

The girl had seen her once. She had ran outside of her home as soon as a particularly harsh storm had subsided; Naminé had little time to hide from her wide, curious gaze, so instead she had stayed on top of a rock and waited for her to collect what she wanted. The islander had reached out to her with a shell in her hand. Naminé had taken it and cracked it open on the rock. The sound had startled the girl at first but the sight of the pearl that was revealed to be inside caused her to scramble across the sand to search for more. She returned with more clams, which Namine cracked and delicately handed the pearls back to the human’s cupped hands. 

That was the day that she had learned the name of one of the humans that lived on the islands - Xion. The name was difficult to wrap her tongue around, as many human words were to a being that communicated with sounds rather than a concrete language. But her face had lit up when she had made a series of clicks that sounded somewhat like ‘Xion’, so Naminé had been proud of her mastery of the strange words humans had for things and people.

After years of storms, she had never seen the child again. There were always other children, growing taller and stronger each time Naminé had caught a glimpse of them. Perhaps Xion had left that island for better shores. Occasionally she saw residents of the islands setting sail on fishing boats or hand-crafted rafts. Some returned to the island, while others had either made it to another land or were shipwrecked on the sharp rocks that lined the coast. Those wrecks often yielded nothing for her but barrels of rations and sketched maps that dissolved as soon as they touched the water. Deserting the islands for a new home was the dream of many, it seemed, but a dream that was rarely realised.

“So.” A young man with silver hair, loosely tied into a bun, wiped sweat from his forehead. He stood next to a raft, built from driftwood that had been scattered along the shore. A painted flag was picked up by the wind; a yellow papou fruit and two keys, styled like a skull and crossbones. “We’ve finally done it. How’s the weather looking? We could test it today if it stays as calm as it is right now.”

Another islander spoke up. He was shorter than his friend, with a face still rounded with youth and freckles splashed over his skin. “Let’s just do it! We’ve waited for years for this, don’t chicken out now! What do you think, Kairi? Isn’t Riku being a bit... chicken?”

“No, he has a point. But if we can go out there without getting caught in rough water, we _have_ to see how far we can go!” The girl turned her head towards the cluster of houses nearby. Her foot tapped against the sand. “But we still have to wait for Xion.”

Xion was taller than when Naminé had last encountered her. She walked with confidence in her step and a grin on her face. Naminé swam behind a rock to avoid her gaze. If the plan of this small group was to venture off of the island, then she would have no other opportunities to see her. The thought made her heart sink as though a rock had been tied to it and it had been thrown into the ocean. Of all the gifts that humans had dedicated to her, although none were truly meant _for_ her, that day spent with Xion collecting pearls had been the most precious. Each time she had seen a child on the beach alone she had yearned to recreate that day. A foolish thought; it would only be the same with Xion.

Naminé scoured the shore for the clams they had found, diving under the water to search the reef until she found one. She cracked the shell against the rock and left both halves for Xion to discover. Her vocal chords were strained as she called her name as well as she could. “Shi-on, shi-on–!”

“Hey! Before we go, you should check the ropes. We can’t go anywhere if the ship falls apart on us!” Xion suggested. Her eyes darted to the opened clam on the rock. Like she had all of those years ago, she crept forward to investigate. Naminé slowly surfaced from beneath the water. She could imagine that she had grown and changed too.

“Shi–“ Her broken call was interrupted by a finger against her lips. Xion took the pearl and rolled it around between her fingers. It fell into the waves with barely a sound. While Xion’s hands fumbled around in the sand, Naminé dove under the calm, clear ocean to retrieve it. Her peach-coloured scales shone in the sun when the top of her tail poked out from the water. It had grown longer, much longer, since they had last met. 

The creature resurfaced, unaware or perhaps uncaring that she had made the mistake of allowing a human to see her tail. Naminé smiled at her. Sharp, fang-like teeth glinted in the sunlight. Xion’s gaze was transfixed on her, her mind so preoccupied that she forgot to flinch away or even look afraid of her predatory features. Her teeth were for hunting fish, not humans, but most humans wouldn’t know the difference. Anything with longer canines than themselves was a potential threat to them, as they lacked equal strength unless supplemented with tools or animals to do their bidding. Naminé reached for her hand and took it, gently if not to initiate a delayed reaction. She spread Xion’s fingers while she only stared in wonder. The pearl was placed in the palm of her hand as though the soft flesh was the inside of a clam and she closed her hand into a fist. 

To her relief, Xion kept her hand tightly shut. She blinked, her eyes matching the colour of the waves. It was summer - the ocean was relatively tame. If she and her friends wished to explore, it was the safest time to do so. “You’re a... that means you can help us! Do you know if there’s anything beyond this place? No one else will give us answers, so we’re looking for ourselves. Oh! You can come with us - Sora broke our compass, and you’d be better at showing the way to land, wouldn’t you?”

Naminé took a moment to understand what Xion was asking of her. She shook her head. Although she went wherever the storms and treasure took her, she was reluctant to observe another boat being lost to the waves. The raft was skilfully crafted, but it was still a raft. She had seen larger and stronger boats wash up on the islands’ shores. It was a train of thought born of paranoia; the four would run into no danger if they avoided rougher waters. Her eyes hovered over the other islanders, who were excitedly preparing the ship and chattering about the journey ahead. There was a possibility that she would lose Xion’s friendly face for a second time, regardless of her survival. It was not uncommon for sailors to remain on the land they found for several months or years before they returned to their homeland.

“Xion! The winds will change if we stay much longer!” Riku called. He was helping the others carry the raft into the water. Xion jumped at the sudden voice from across the beach. Without a word to her - perhaps what Riku had said was time-sensitive - Xion left to join them. Her feet kicked up sand as she ran. Naminé raised her hand out of the water to wave her goodbye.

Something glimmered on the shoreline as it was getting picked up by the gently lapping waves. It was a delicately made necklace, strung with pearls in shades that ranged from the purest white to pale pink and blue. She could see no other man-made items floating above the water, so Naminé doubted that it came from a shipwreck. She watched the raft drift through the waves with ease and picked up the necklace. It had to belong to Xion, and fell when she had left in a rush.

“Shi!” She begun to swim after her, the odd tongue sounding hoarse in her throat. The raft had already started to be tugged by the wind into the open ocean. It’s crew waved goodbye to their home. One, the red-headed girl, stared wistfully back at the islands from where she sat on the edge of the boat.

When she approached the raft, she dipped below the water to ensure that she wasn’t seen. It was possible to leave the necklace on the raft to be found. They would wonder where it came from but if it truly belonged to Xion then she would be thankful for it’s safe return. The boat rocked under the waves that her tail had strengthened and left the four young islanders clinging onto any surface they could find, including each other.

“W-what was that?” Kairi, the girl that had been watching their homeland start to vanish from view, sounded shaken. She had held tightly onto Riku, who was closest to the mast. “This far out, it could be _anything_!” The concept appeared to both terrify and excite her.

A slightly shorter boy with windswept hair and a smug expression crossed his arms as he paced along the raft. “Oh come on! That was barely a wave!” His stand-offish tone made Naminé smile. She could afford to have a little fun after she had ventured so far from the shore. The mermaid dived underneath the raft to cause further disturbance. The stories the islanders told about her around their campfires tended to make her a benevolent creature, but all creatures had an equally strong mischievous side.

“Hey! You don’t think there’s something... beneath us, do you? Xion, do you think it’s a shark?”

Xion turned. Naminé had ensured that she would have caught a glimpse of her tail above the water. She only wished to cause slight panic, not discourage the group from exploring altogether. “No way! If it was a shark we would have capsized by now, and we’d all be shark food. Well, if it was hungry.”

Their discussion provided Naminé with an opportunity to place the necklace on the deck of the raft. The moment that her hand touched the smooth, driftwood planks, she felt herself being lifted out of the water. She struggled and squirmed like a fish, desperate to be set free. The serious, calm face of the silver-haired boy met her wide, blue eyes. Naminé pointed downwards. Riku sat down with her, a tight grip on her wrists so that she didn’t slip away.

“I never thought I’d see one in person... Were you trying to steal from our ship?”

Naminé had to make an effort not to struggle. Her tail tapped against the wood, aching to feel the soothing presence of water again. She opened her hand to reveal the necklace and pointed the other at Xion. “Shi...”

“You know the mermaid? I thought you didn’t believe in those stories.” Riku looked up at Xion with a mocking smile. She huffed in acknowledgement. The crew of the raft were at the age, then, that humans believed it was childish to listen to the stories that their island had cultivated for them.

Xion crouched down beside them and took the necklace from her, her fingers brushing against each of the pearls in turn. “It was actually meant _for_ you. You like human things, from shipwrecks, don’t you? I made you something that you don’t have to steal. Something from the islands that you can keep.” She unclasped the necklace and placed it around her neck.

Naminé stared down at it, then up at her. She had done nothing to deserve such a gift from her. Was this Xion’s form of reverence? Riku’s grip on her loosened and she returned to the ocean, the cool water soothing the new, red marks where Riku had held onto her. Kairi and Sora were staring too, asking if they had missed the mermaid with voices seeping with disappointment. Xion opened her mouth as though to say something, but changed her mind when Naminé’s tail poked up from the water as she swam alongside the raft. This time, Naminé decided, she would prefer to join a voyage rather than discover one.


End file.
